But back to the business at hand. This year, I wanted to make sure I did some Mardi Gras cookies before I left on vacation (YES, say it with me “VACATION”) but I didn’t have enough time to take a stab at another elaborate mask set. But those purples, yellows, and greens – how could I not make Mardi Gras cookies?!?

Trouble was, I don’t own a mask cookie cutter. But then I looked through my cutters and my new Wilton set jumped out at me. It’s this one. The mustache and lips cutters could make perfect Mardi Gras masks.

The mustache cookie cutter becomes a very small and very thin mask:

And the lips cutter, when flipped, makes a great jester Mardi Gras mask:

I hope this can be helpful for my fellow don’t-own-a-mask-cutter cookie friends! Happy Mardi Gras!

And now I have the Modern English song stuck in my head. Which is not a bad way to spend the day🙂

But I digress…here’s a quick little tutorial on how to make these happy little love cones.

To start, bake your cookies with the use of an ice cream cookie cutter and a small heart cookie cutter. I apologize, but I didn’t get a picture of the process with the dough. Basically, you begin by cutting into the top of your ice cream cookie with the bottom of the heart. Cut out a small heart from the dough, place it into the ice cream gap that you just made. And then repeat. And repeat. Until you have three heart scoops like this:

I have no idea who’s playing in the Super Bowl this weekend. I didn’t even know that it was two words – I had to look that up. I know one team may be the Seahawks because I’ve been seeing lots of amazing Super Bowl cookies on Facebook and Instagram lately. And the other team has Manning? Does that sound right? He’s pretty amazing on SNL.

So yes, I may not love football all that much. But you know what? I come for the food. Because I heart food. And planning out some tasty dishes for Super Bowl Sunday is what’s up for me.

And I’ll have tasty football cookies. So no one can be really upset that I’m not paying attention to the game – right?😉

And I’ve bundled them up because ladies and gents, it’s been a heck of a winter. Especially here in MI.

A few tips if you’re going to attempt these cookies:

Start by outlining and flooding the brown of the football, but leave room for the hat.

When your brown icing is fairly dry and you’re ready to start icing your hat, pipe the bottom of the hat first. Wait 20 minutes or so, then pipe and flood the rest of the hat. This will give your cookie some dimension.

I piped the eyes with a #2, but did the rest of the details with a #1 – it really helped with the finer details.

When adding the details, pipe the bottom white line first, then the laces. Having those piped first will help you when placing the eyes and mouths.

I can’t believe that my daughter will be 3 in May. Three going on 15. This one keeps me young🙂

And I can’t believe that it’s been almost 2 years since her Dr. Seuss birthday party and I have yet to share the details. I wanted to share details of her birthday party so that I could finally give credit to the amazing bloggers that gave me so much inspiration.

Since we owned practically all of the Dr. Seuss books, it was a more than appropriate party theme.

First, the decor. I stuck to teal, red, yellow, and white, which helped me get some basic decorations from Party City. I used white vases that I already had and jazzed them up with ribbon thanks to this inspiration and some twirly vase fillers and boas that I found at the craft store. And the morning of, I sent my Dad out for cheap, simple bouquets to fill the vases.

As guests entered, they were greeted by hanging Dr. Seuss quotes, thanks to Annie’s Eats and her awesome idea here.

Every single food item was Seuss related.

Deviled eggs as “Green Eggs No Ham” and pasta salad as “Oodles of Noodles”. With inspiration from the Sweet Designs by Amy Atlas blog here, I got the idea to put fruit on sticks as “Truffula Fruits”. And I found the great idea for “Cat Hats” here at Anders Ruff.

I ran out of time to make a full-blown cake, so I made Thing 1 and Thing 2 cupcakes thanks to the help of some homemade cupcake liners and very high frosting. And the green jello? It’s “Oobleck”!

The Girl Who Ate Everything has a great tutorial for “Green Eggs and Ham” here.

Shame. Shame on me. I haven’t posted in quite some time. Mostly due to some unforeseen life changes happening around here, mostly due to lack of time.

But…I’m back with a new post and a promise to post tutorials on a more regular basis. Nothing can stop me! Well, nothing except some more unforeseen life changes but let’s hope that stress was the last of it.

And what better way to come back with a bang than to celebrate Earth Day? I give you: simple and quick Earth Day Cookies!!!

I chose to make mine with my heart cutter, but you could always use a simple round cutter as well. These took half a day to decorate, so they’re super easy to make.

To make these you’ll need:

Baked cookies

Light blue royal icing

Green royal icing

Black royal icing

Candy eyeballs

Start by outlining your cookie with the light blue icing.

Immediately flood the whole cookie with light blue icing.

*Excuse the extremely blurry photo, I had a case of the two-much-coffees.

As soon as you’re done flooding the cookie, pop two candy eyeballs on your cookie. These are the candy eyeballs I used, from Wilton.

You want to do this while your icing is still wet so that the eyeballs will dry with the icing and adhere nicely.

Then…try not to be creeped out.

It’s like it’s watching you…constantly…

Give your cookies an hour or two to dry. Perhaps put them in the oven or in a pantry, so those creepy eyeballs don’t keep staring up at you.

When your cookies have dried, you can start outlining the continents with green icing.

Remember, it doesn’t have to be accurate. I didn’t strive for accuracy because I wanted to have enough room for facial features and, let’s face it, the Earth isn’t heart-shaped either.

What better way to represent St. Patrick’s Day than with the green garb everyone sports that day, right? I mean, people will give you a hard time if you’re out celebrating and you’re not wearing green. I myself had to go out and get a shirt to wear for the occasion. Since I was very late to the game it was slim pickins. I ended up with a shirt that says “World’s Cutest Leprechaun”. I’ll give you all a moment to shake your head at me. At 5″9′, I’m hardly a “cute leprechaun” :p

These are so simple to make, you’ll be like “woah”. And they turn out so stinkin’ cute – perfect for St. Patrick’s Day! Makes me want to go chasing rainbows (is that a thing?).

To make these, you’ll need:

Mini Oreos or Mini Nutter Butters (I used the Spring Oreos because they have that cute little yellow filling)

Yellow Candy Melts

Gold Color Mist Spray

Chocolate Candy Coating

A balloon

Start by melting the yellow candy melts in the microwave (tip: add a little vegetable oil to make dipping easier). Do this in 20 second intervals to avoid burning the melts.

Using a spoon, dip the mini Oreos into the yellow candy melts and then let them dry on a cookie sheet covered in wax paper. Don’t worry about them being messy after dipping, we’ll fix that later.

Let these dry completely (about 15-30 minutes).

Once they’re dry, spray them with the gold mist and let them dry for 10-15 minutes.

Using a sharp knife, cut off the excess candy on each cookie.

Use the chocolate candy coating and the balloon to make a little chocolate bowl (or little cauldron, in this case). I’ll let the fantastic Mandy from Gourmet Mom On-The-Go walk you through that process since…as you can tell…my cauldrons came out a bit iffy🙂

Some of you may or may not have noticed the recent change from this logo:

To this logo:

For starters, my lovely friend has been helping me design a new logo. I think it’s pretty awesome. We’re slowly working on changing everything over to the new style and redesigning the site so it’s easier for everyone to navigate. I hope you will all bear with me in the meantime, while we make these necessary changes.

You’ve probably also noticed a change from the “z” in Elizabeth to an “s”. Here’s where the funny story comes into play. Three years ago, when I decided to dive head first into baking, I decided to name my little blog after my late grandmother. She had always been my inspiration in the kitchen and one of my most favorite people in the world. Last May, I gave birth to a darling bundle of joy. The minute I found out I was having a girl there was no doubt in my mind that her middle name would be my grandmother’s name. Then one day (before her arrival) my mother and I were talking and she said “you know it’s with an s right?”. And then it hit me. All this time, I thought my grandmother’s name was with a “z” and had no idea it was actually with an “s”, which is the German version. I was this close to giving my daughter the wrong middle name! Of course, I find it pretty comical, this little twist that I never knew. We always called her “meme”, I had no idea.

After finding out, it was agreed that it was only just to rename my little site and pay true homage to my grandmother’s name.

And there you have it. The true (yet, slightly embarrassing/comical) reason behind the name change😉

Happy It’s-almost-St.-Patrick’s-Day-and-it’s-on-a-Saturday-this-year day! Can you tell I’m excited for St. Patrick’s Day? Nope, not Irish, just a big fan of the day. And it’s not the drinking part that I love (although I do love a good Guinness), it’s the fun, colorful, happy feel of the whole day.

So this year, I decided to come up with some simple, yet cute, St. Patrick’s Day goodies! First up, leprechaun hat pops. I wanted something that would take less than an hour to make. So, although these are a little rough on the edges, they’re quick and easy to make!

So let’s grab our supplies!

You’ll need:

Oreos (the Spring ones are the best because they have yellow filling!)

Cookie sticks

Green Candy Melts

Marshmallows

Black Edible Food Marker

Yellow Candies For The Buckle (I used some Wilton sprinkles that I had)

Place your candy melts in a microwave safe bowl and microwave them in 20 second intervals until they are melted. I like to add a little bit of vegetable oil to my candy melts to make dipping easier. Using a spoon or a toothpick through the cookie, dip your Oreos into the candy melts and place them on a cookie sheet covered with wax paper to dry.

While those dry, take your marshmallows and place them on the end of the cookie sticks.

Dip the marshmallows in the candy melts until they are completely covered. Make sure you let the extra coating run off a bit.

Place these stick side up on the wax paper to dry as well.

Once both the Oreos and marshmallows are dry, use a bit of melted candy to attach the marshmallows to the Oreos, to form the hat.

Let these dry for about 5 minutes. Then, take your edible marker and draw on the belt (is it a belt since it’s on a hat? I’m not quite sure).

The last step is to use a little bit of the melts to attach the yellow candy as the belt buckle. (again, belt?) Top them off with ribbon and you’re all set!

Happy Baking!

Note: You’ll notice that these hats are “upside down” essentially and not at the top of the stick. I tried desperately to pop a hole in the Oreos and put the cookie stick through, but alas, it always resulted in a broken Oreo. And then when I found this post I was like “of course!” to using Nilla Wafers instead. Go ahead and visit the Dollhouse Bake Shoppe to see the leprechaun hat pop tutorial – they’re adorable!

Welcome!

I inherited my passion for baking from the best baker and teacher I know, my grandmother Elisabeth. Today, I embark on my baking adventures with the help of my trusted sidekick, my sweet daughter Jude. Thanks for stopping by!

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I can deliver anywhere in the Detroit, MI area and ship cookies anywhere within the US. Let's chat! Send me an email at sweetlizbakes@gmail.com.